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Topic: Loving and Leaving
Date: October 19, 1997
By Mike Brown

Abortion, by its very nature is a "sexist" event. A man's inability to conceive limits his ability to get pregnant. But, this same failing of his gender should not limit his responsibility to the woman with whom he has had some sort of sexual relation. Should not, but very often does.

For every woman who procures an abortion, there is a man who is at least partly to blame for the circumstance in which she found herself. How many went alone to the doctor's office, and how many had the husband, boyfriend, or one-nighter with them? How many men are there when she tells her family? How many men were instrumental in the decision to abort the foetus? And how many men suffer the heartache and agony of the abortion, at the time and for the rest of their lives?

The answer to most of those questions is "a few", maybe even "a lot". But the answer to the last question is "none". And it is because of that, many of the other questions become irrelevant - except one.

What selfish ideas have to be running through a guy's head when he goes through his litany of reasons that she must have an abortion? "What am I gonna do? I don't need a family right now", "I already have a wife and kids", "This is going to tie me down, strap me for cash", "This is going to cramp my lifestyle", "I've almost got the car paid for - I don't need this". Maybe it's just that he's not ready for a family.

"I guess you know what you have to do. It's the right thing - for you, for me, and even for the baby".

If you're sexually active, whether your 15-years old, or fifty, you'd better be prepared for a family. That's the funny thing about intercourse - it's part of procreation. Being pro-life, when I read stories about women who have undergone abortions alone, or worse are coerced into the procedure from some guy - husband, lover, boyfriend - who bares neither the physical or emotional scars of an abortion, my resolve to stop the procedure as a means of contraception redoubles.

A man launching into a physical relationship, without consideration for the possible consequences of that relationship, pales in comparison to a man whose solution to a pregnancy in which he wants no part is that he convince the woman to procure an abortion. It is irresponsible, it is contemptible, and more, it is the decision of a coward.

Life is difficult, and sometimes we experience something which makes it even more difficult. Shirking on the responsibilities of fatherhood is bad in itself. But to do so with the termination of the very life we helped to create, simply because that life is inconvenient, is vial.

Abortion, regardless of who makes the decision, is a death: the death of a child, a life, a soul. A man convincing a woman of her need for an abortion then, to me, makes this man complicit in a murder, and no better than the people who provide the abortion, or demand it's free and easy access.

Mike.
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Copyright © 1997 Mike Brown
Reprinted here with permission from the author

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